“Mom, Have you ever bought a fairytale pumpkin?” Rebecca asked me on Halloween.

“A WHAT?”

She pointed to the buckskin colored Jack-o-lantern resembling Cinderella’s coach carved on her stoop and I gasped with delight. “Wow,” I gushed. “How beautiful it is.”

I had a vague recollection of seeing these pumpkins in the store, but I had never bought one nor did I know anything about them. The next thing I knew she was off to the store, soon to return with another large fairytale pumpkin.

“For you,” she said, handing me the fake looking pumpkin.

“Oh thank you, dear. But today is Halloween. Should we carve it now?”

“No, silly. I thought you might want to COOK with it. While Archer and I were carving ours, I happened to taste the raw pumpkin and it was AMAZING!! Sweet!! Delicious!”

After the Halloween festivities, I brought the pumpkin home, belted in the back seat of my car, and set it on our bar in the family room. Every day I stared at it. Every day I wondered what to do with it, whether I should cook it or just enjoy its beauty. It brought back lots of lovely memories of fairytales and make-believe and, between you and me, I almost could see it on wheels with mice for coachmen. But Rebecca had told me how delicious hers tasted and I was really curious to try it. Finally, last week, I couldn’t stand the suspense any longer and cut it open.

Usually when you open a pumpkin, most of its volume is made of air surrounded by a thin shell of meat. But I found that the fairytale pumpkins are different. They have a very small hollow area and thick sides, more like an acorn squash, so that one pumpkin gives you a lot of pumpkin meat, and by a lot, I mean A LOT. The bright orange flesh (the color of a yam) begged me to try it and as Rebecca told me, it was delicious raw…sweet like sugar and tasted more like a butternut squash than pumpkin. By the time I cut up the entire thing, I had pumpkin everywhere in my kitchen. “Now what am I going to do with all this pumpkin?”

Six days later I had made the following: 2 batches of pumpkin soup, four servings of roasted pumpkin with caramelized onions (cassolita), roasted pumpkin with other root vegetables, two huge loaves of pumpkin bread, two pumpkin pies, and 2 pans of plump pumpkin enchiladas. All of this with ONE PUMPKIN costing $4!! And although I felt like the pumpkin was multiplying in the kitchen and could never be used up, after I had made all of this I thought to myself, what a waste to take these guys and use them for Jack-o-lanterns! Not only that, fairytale pumpkins, it turns out, are the SWEETEST and tastiest squash you can eat.

Their true name is Musque de Provence and, as the name suggests, they’re originally from France. On the outside, they look like they were carved out of wood, but inside of them is an orgy of orange flesh, succulent and delicious. You might be able to still find some at farmer’s markets but pumpkins in grocery stores, unfortunately, have disappeared. (Has anyone else ever wondered where they are whisked off to after Halloween? Pumpkin cemeteries? Pumpkin factories? Pumpkin heaven?) If you can’t find one, grow one next summer—my research shows they are easy to grow—or wait until October and they’ll be everywhere. Buy a couple in early October and cook up the meat, freezing the raw pumpkin or cooked puree for future pies, breads, or main dish meals.

When preparing fresh pumpkin for recipes that call for a puree, either mash with a potato masher and then mash again in a sieve to get rid of excess water, or process in a food processor and then drain in a sieve. Let stand for a half hour, or quicken the process by pushing the pumpkin down with a fork or masher.

I got this recipe from my friend, Mary. It makes 2 large loafs so you can freeze one for later.

Coconut Walnut Pumpkin Bread

3 ½ cups four

2 cups brown sugar (I put ½ cups because this pumpkin is so sweet)

½ cup sugar

2 tsp baking soda

1 ½ tsp salt

1 tsp nutmeg

1 ½ tsp

cinnamon

2 cups pumpkin puree

1 cup vegetable oil

2/3 cup milk or coconut milk

4 large eggs

1 ¼ cups sweetened flaked coconut

1 cup toasted walnuts, chopped

Preheat oven to 350. Butter and dust with flour two 8”x4” loaf pans. Sift into a large bowl the flour, brown sugar, sugar, baking soda, salt, nutmeg and cinnamon. (note…I didn’t sift…I just mixed well with a fork). In a separate bowl, whisk together pumpkin puree, oil, milk and eggs. Stir pumpkin mixture into dry ingredients, mixing only to combine. Fold in coconut and walnuts. Divide batter between the two prepared pans. Bake at 350 until top of bread springs back when pressed gently and a tester inserted in bread’s center comes out clean (50 minutes- 1 hour). Allow bread to cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes before turning out of pans. Allow bread to cool completely on a wire rack.

This is awesome! I was just joking last night that since fall = pumpkin everything, I should do a five-course meal that was all based on pumpkin. Pumpkin soup, pumpkin salad, pumpkin entree... Looks like WWW did a good chunk of my planning for me!

I was craving a good mole sauce so much that I had the hubs drive us out to highland park on Sunday for some enchiladas de mole. I am so excited to try pumpkin enchiladas and make my own mole sauce! I love that you post many vegetarian mexican recipes as I am a vegetarian who lives for mexican food. I've made both your rellenos and the spinach enchiladas and both were awesome. Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm one of your many non parent lurkers :) First time commenter, 2+ reader. I'm trying not to get all groupie on you but I have to say I love your blog! During a recent stretch of unemployment (thats over thank god) I had the opportunity to read your blog and often your writing was the sunshine in otherwise poopy days. Thank you for letting us in to your unique world. Archer & Fable obviously have an amazing mother but I'm sure they already know. Lol. Alright now that I've made an ass of myself with blog-groupiness I have to say I'll be adding that pumpkin coconut bread to my families thanksgiving feast. Thanks for the delicious recipe(s). The gnocchi recipe turned out perfect :)

jessica
| 2:51 PM

saw those at the farm where we went apple picking and they were actually labeled "pumpkins for baking" so i guess that's what they're good for!

Ok now i'm stuffing my face with the coconut pumpkin bread...LOVE it soooo much! I am thankful for you!xoxo

jessica
| 6:32 AM

I wish i liked your food- it looks fabulous! unfortunately i was raised on tv dinners and have never acquired a taste for anything much better. i've tried, believe me, i've tried. my husband gets so mad. i have tried to explain that i don't chose to be like this. who would want to have such limited choices when they go out to eat?? i'm the girl who orders a cheeseburger no matter where i go. having a bday dinner at an awesome seafood restaurant? i ask, "do they serve burgers?" The closest i get to seafood is tuna. and that's only sometimes because i go through phases where i can't even eat that. it's a bland life :(

Cara
| 7:22 AM

Thanks so much for the recipes! Here in France, they sell these cut in quarters because they provide so much to cook at once! I have been making baby food and soup (with onions & pears) for ages, but am excited to try the bread recipe!Happy Thanksgiving!

I LOVE the teamwork between you two (WWW and GGC). I love how inspired you both are about your posts, and I love the new organization so I can find the foodie ones so easily, even though I love digging through others. Lots of lovelovelove. Happy Thanksgiving!